By Firelight
by Ione
Summary: A wedding is often an occasion for joy and celebration, but for Loki and Jane, it is neither. Both of them arrive at the bridal bed full of their own doubts and fears. Both of them leave far different. Viking pastiche!arranged marriage AU. Lokane. ONESHOT.
**By Firelight**

A gift fic for puresummermagic

The wedding feast was roaring, quite literally. Loki winced as Volstagg's bellows of victory shook the very drinking horns where they lay, abandoned and empty, on the long tables. The great russet-bearded giant threw aside his latest barrel of mead and belched, to the applause and raucous laughter of the assembled crowd.

Loki could only but be pleased that his new-made wife was safely out of this mess. It shamed him somewhat to think of the pinched look on her face as the feast had devolved into ribald songs, coarse jests, and amateur wrestling contests. He hated that all the Lady Jane Foster, late of London, knew of him was this rough, uncultured atmosphere. He knew she had not come to their marriage with a ready will; after tonight, he imagined he would have much work laid out to convince her that he was not of their kind.

Thinking of this—thinking of her, waiting for him beneath the furs of their marriage bed—he swallowed, throat suddenly and painfully dry. He drained one mug, then another, and had poured himself a third by the time he realized he was only delaying the inevitable. And if he went to his bride too drunk to stand, it would hardly improve his chances of reconciling her to their match.

Loki stood, gritting his teeth as his head heaved and plunged like a storm-caught boat. Thor caught his arm and anchored him firmly to the ground until the room stopped spinning.

"Grown tired of the celebration already, brother?" he cried, white teeth blinding in the deep smoky darkness of the hall, "Or are you too eager for what lies ahead to waste more time with us?"

"Surely you do not think an unwilling maid a sight to anticipate?" he countered, swallowing now on acid bile. "You may never have experienced rejection from a woman, but be assured it is something the rest of we mere mortals are accustomed to."

"Ah," Thor boomed, grinning, "but were she mine, she would not be so unwilling!"

Loki gripped Thor's hand where it clung to his shoulder and threw it off. "Surely the occasion of my own wedding might free me from such jibes? Surely you do not think I could forget—even for a moment—that you were my bride's preference until our father came between you?"

"It was not merely our father's choice," Thor said, taking the rebuke and lowering his voice. "I offered myself to Jane, and she would not have me. She said our dalliance had not made her forget that I was to be King, and that she had no desire to be Queen. In truth," and now his radiant face was solemn, pensive, "I would it had been otherwise. She is…a rare woman, your wife. I might have loved her."

Well Loki knew that his brother was a man of feeling, but it was so seldom expressed that this sudden confession was shocking. He could not help but feel admiration at Thor's restraint, to seem so cheerful at the sight of the woman he loved marrying his own brother.

It was not in him to respond in kind. "I have no doubt," he began, bitterly, "that your beloved will soon grow to regret her impulsive choice. A mere aversion towards ruling does not mean she will grow to love a lesser son."

"I do not think that is her way," Thor replied. "Jane knows her mind. She made her choice for good reasons, though I knew them not. I would ask her reasoning before judging her unjustly."

"Perhaps I shall," he agreed, unable to free his mind of doubt, "Good night, Thor."

"A very good night to you," he replied, winking. Then, with an arm thrown out to the company, he roared, "Prince Loki retires! Wish him luck!"

Amid the cheers and lewd good wishes of the crowd, Loki slinked out of the hall, the back of his neck and his ears aflame with embarrassment. He could only pray that Jane had not heard the ruckus.

()()()

It was clear she had. A similar rosy shade tinted her face and spread down her neck, disappearing into the high collar of her snowy nightdress. She sat by the fire, a book open before her, upright and tense with one fist clenched in her lap. As Loki stepped into the room and shut the door behind him, Jane lifted her head and nodded, lips working as though to speak.

She said nothing. Neither did he. After a long moment, she closed the book carefully on its marker and set it well away from the hearth. Then she stood, head bowed and hands twisting together beneath her breast.

"Good evening, my lord," she said at last, forcing her hands to rest by her side.

"My lady," he replied. The silence stretched again, a smothering wave waiting to drown them both.

"I bring the good wishes of my kin," he winced; reminding Jane of Thor was poorly done, but he had had to say something. The way her pale face studied the stones beneath his feet as her long eyelashes fluttered made something helpless and despairing twist in his gut.

A faint smile touched her face as the blush on her skin burnt afresh. "I heard."

Loki could not move. The room, low-ceilinged and warm, spoke too much of the task they had to accomplish that night. Every surface was smothered in soft furs, placed for comfort and romance. At that moment, though, he felt just about as romantic as the cows bellowing for their evening's milking in the barns. If he took one step into the room, he would have to set to his task.

He wasn't ready.

"Would you care for a drink?" Jane's voice was pitched high and desperate, whistling like a kettle, "They left a bottle or two of…whiskey, I think. My father brought some along, for the…the celebration."

"Yes," he said. Trust a clever woman like Jane to arrive at a solution. Drinking was an excellent idea. If he drank enough, perhaps he could forget himself long enough to—

No. No thinking of that. Whiskey first.

Jane turned away and rattled some glasses on the low table near the fire. As she poured, Loki took a tentative step towards the warmth of the fire, grateful that its ruddy light would disguise the uncertainty in his eyes and the high color in his cheeks.

However, the firelight did him a great disservice. It turned the fine muslin of Jane's gown transparent; in its rosy illumination, he could see the curves of her graceful, sapling body as if through a morning's gauzy fog.

It took more will than he liked to admit to drag his gaze from the peak of her breast back to her eyes when she offered him a glass near overfull with liquor.

She had a glass just as full; before Loki could think to propose a toast, she had drained half of it and was smothering a hacking cough behind one hand.

He laughed. "Be easy, Jane," the helpless look in her eyes was adorable, "We have all night."

"We do?" she said, "They all told me you would want—" she stopped, looking down at her glass, clutched between trembling hands, "I promised myself I would not be afraid, but…I am. I am sorry."

"You have nothing to apologize for," he said, sipping his own drink. The whiskey warmed him, to be sure, but it was Jane's confession that truly eased the sick feeling in his stomach. "We need do nothing until you are prepared."

"Oh, thank you!" she cried, eyes wide with gratitude. They fixed on his face without fear, and Loki found himself rather enjoying her forthright gaze. Far better to be honest and truthful with a wife than otherwise, Loki decided. Many of his married compatriots had told him so, of course, but he had assumed honesty only arose once the initial awkwardness was out of the way.

How far did he dare take that idea?

"Do you think you would have been more at ease with my brother?" it was a question that writhed within like a poisonous snake, but Loki convinced himself it would be better to have the truth now than later. "He told me he wished for your hand."

Jane sighed. Her eyes fluttered a bit, but did not leave his face. "No," she said at last. "there were many reasons I would not have Thor."

"Such as?"

"Well," and now she was blushing again, "because I would rather have you."

It was Loki's turn to sputter on his drink. "There has never been a woman between us who would prefer me to Thor," a dark suspicion twisted his lips, "You need not flatter me for fear of me, Jane. I know well how the men of England treat their wives, but any man here would lose his lands for the same."

"You do not believe me?" she was crestfallen, but Loki was an accomplished actor enough to doubt her sincerity. A pale face and bitten lips were easy to counterfeit. "You do not believe me because I am a woman, just like all the others between you?" Now her anger built. "Perhaps I should do you the same courtesy, and take no note of the vast differences that separate you from Thor. After all, you are both men!"

"I meant no offense," he raised one hand, "but you do not know our past. If I have misjudged you, I am sorry for it."

"Yet you will not believe me all the same," she scoffed.

"Jane," he touched her clenched fist, feeling again the delicate skin and fragile bones he'd only touched once before at their wedding, "please. I am sorry. I never wish for you to hide your thoughts from me."

Instead of replying, she turned her hand so their palms slid together. The sound of her gentle gasp was nearly hidden among the hissing pops of the fire, but Loki heard it all the same. It stirred something in him, something sinuous and urgent. For the first time, he thought of their task with anticipation, not dread. It would be something to discover the secret truths of this beautiful woman, so unlike those he had known before.

"When I saw you first," she murmured, running her thumb over the hard protrusions of his knuckles, "you were reading. Only the scholars in our great libraries read, or some of the clergy. The princes of my land are read to, barely attending even when their kingdoms depend on the knowledge of others."

Her fingers ranged farther, running down the buried roots of his veins. Loki could feel his heartbeat—among other things—rising at this gentle, curious caress.

"When the men here laughed at my pretentions to study, you did not. You looked at me like," she paused, gaze darting up for an instant before dropping again to the neutral ground of their linked hands. "I could not tell. If I," she paused, "If I asked you to teach me things, if I wanted to learn beyond the realm of what is permitted a woman…would you forbid me?"

Loki was not certain he would forbid her anything, so long as she did not stop touching him. "Never."

She smiled. She held his hand gently between the two of hers, so small in comparison, and brought it up to her mouth.

At the first touch of her rose-petal lips, Loki had to choke back a moan. The liquor made it hard to focus on the greater details of the room, but he could distinguish the exact shade of her lips, gauge the arc of their graceful curves. He leaned forward and met them with his own, drawing her from her seat and into his. She came with no resistance, merely a surprised catch of breath as their mouths met, parted, and joined again.

()()()

They managed to accomplish their necessary, dreaded task several times that night. The following morning, Thor met Loki with a grin big enough to encompass Yggdrasil itself.


End file.
